Nene History

Street Names-What do They Mean?

When Mr. Stead developed Indianhead Acres, his wife worked with Mr. Cash, a librarian at the old State Library to give the streets authentic Seminole names. First of all, Nene means “trail”. Beginning with Jim Lee Road they originally wanted to name it Humpin Nene, meaning First Trail.

The Old Farmhouse – Where is it Now?

Many years ago, in the late 1940’s a barn and an old farmhouse sat on a hill that is now the site of Pier 1 Imports store. The land going as far back as Jim Lee Road, approximately 480 acres, was owned by Mr. and Mrs. John Stead. The land was previously known as Indianhead Plantation. Mr. Stead moved the house to a different location, before slowly leveling the hill. The farmhouse was later accidentally burned down by a transient.

The Great Land Sale

In 1947 Mr. John Stead offered to sell to the City of Tallahassee the property from St. Augustine Road to the Old Perry Road (US-27) for one dollar for the purpose of building a school and stadium. At the time, the City Council said that this area was too far out of town to ever be developed and turned down the offer. Just a short time later, the county approached the Steads and purchased the land where Hartsfield School now stands.

Indian Mounds

Mr. Koucky built about 200 of the homes in Indianhead Acres. Starting in the early 1950’s working his crew and making the streets, Indian artifacts were forever turning up. Once when working at the south end of Wahalaw Nene, he came across three Indian mounds. He called F.S.U. to come investigate. They were discovered to be “ceremonial mounds”.

Indianhead Airport

Airplanes landing here in Indianhead Acres? Not the big commercial airplanes, like at the airport, but there was at one time a landing strip right here in our neighborhood! Small planes would take off and land all the time. The landing strip was located in a field between Chowkeebin Nene and St. Augustine Road, just north of Wahalaw Nene.

Indianhead Acres Lake

Mr. Koucky remembers seeing an old photograph of people getting water from the head of the stream between East and West Indianhead Drives. He said many years ago people would come out here from town to get their water, then carry it all the way back. The land where Optimist Park resides used to be completely under water. A dam was situated just north of Hokolin Nene with a huge pipe running under the road, thus forming the lake. In the late 1950’s during a heavy storm, debris clogged the vent pipe causing the main flow pipe to collapse, thus flooding the homes in the low lying areas south of the dam. Instead of fixing the dam and re-creating the lake, the county just filled in the now drained lake and turned it into a park. There are still people living in Indianhead Acres that can remember seeing small sailboats and canoes on the lake, with people sitting around on the bank and fishing .

NOTE: The above information was composed by a local resident of Indian Head Acres, Mark Hannum.